I love the French tradition of celebrating Christmas. On Christmas eve, everybody gathers around the dinner table and eat crystallized fruits and candied chestnuts. I tried last time I went to France and they are delicious: http://www.histoiresucree.com/product_c ... andied.htm

I personally like the Italian tradition of eating various fish dishes on Christmas Eve. Its origin is in the Roman Catholic tradition of not eating meat on Christmas Eve, but the Italians have really perfected it with various types of fish. If you are a fish lover, you can't wait to sit at the dinner table on Christmas Eve.

I am familiar with this Roman Catholic tradition CK, and speaking of various types of fish, could you advise me on some that are tasty without being overly 'fishy'? I like a mild taste to fish and I'm trying to broaden my taste palate because I know fish is a lot more 'heart healthy'...I love tilapia cooked any way, salmon's alright...what are some others? Perhaps we could try something new with the perfected Italian flare this Christmas Eve..

scungilli. Sometimes we even use crab For the none Italians reading Calamari is squid and the scungilli is refered to as Italian Conch but its more like a kind of a whelk. We also have a large antipasto with Caponata (marinated eggplant) fresh mozzarella cheese, tomatoes, kalamata olives, black olives, mini stuffed peppers, marinated artichoke, and sometimes some marinated or pickled vegetables. We have pasta course too! lots of food LOL

When i was younger in Quebec we use to have dinner on the 24th and open all our gifts on the 25 around noon . Meal was mostly Vulture ( jokking) Turkey and cranberry with mashed patatoes and for desert it was fruit cake with ice cream . I am speaking for our familly ( we were 3 in total mom dad and me ) but no matter what the people were doing that is what we used to do year after year and at that time (10 years old) i didnt like that lolllllll . Now i am so missing that it's not like it used to be anymore........